The UK may have entered what experts say could be the longest recession in a century as official statisticians said the economy shrank by 0.2% between July and September.
The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt warned that he will be making “eye-watering” decisions after the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said gross domestic product (GDP) fell in September. These are the biggest quarterly and monthly falls since the UK has come out of lockdown, and if the economy also shrinks in the final three months of this year – as experts predict – it would push the economy into a recession that could last for two years.
The Chancellor will reveal his autumn budget on Thursday, November 17, in which he will be working to make a possible recession “shallower and quicker”. But this will include painful public spending cuts and tax hikes, as he insisted there is a so-called black hole in the nation’s finances.
